Data is often acquired in order to characterize properties of physical devices and/or their degree of functionality. Sometimes the data constitutes an accurate representation of these aspects, so that conclusions regarding the device and its operational characteristics can be reliably drawn directly from the data. In other cases, the set of data includes outlier data points, which is data that does not conform to the behavior of other points in the set.
Outlier data points (i.e., “outliers”), if included in data that is used to draw inferences about the device and/or its operations, can lead to erroneous conclusions. Thus, much effort may be spent in determining whether some portion of a particular data set is truly representative of the underlying trend that is present in the other data, or not.